Who Stole My Life?

by C. P. IRVINE, IAN

  We edge a little closer and leaning out as far as I can go, my fingers grasp for the bundle at the same time as Sarah pushes it towards me.

  Then a sudden gust of wind, and our baskets separate abruptly, the bundle slipping from between our hands,… falling, …falling…, dropping to the earth and hard ground, far, far below.

  Tipped backwards by the jerking of the balloon, I fall backwards into the bottom of the basket and sprawl at the foot of my pilot.

  The two balloons drift past each other.

  I am screaming at the hooded pilot, begging him to somehow stop, to turn the balloon around.

  He looks down at me, and laughs. A high pitched, feminine laugh.

  Reaching up a hand, and pulling back the hood, reveals a smiling, laughing face.

  It is Jane.

  --------------------

  Typically of Scotland, little has changed in Ravelston Dykes since I was last here. Tall, detached, sprawling Victorian town-houses, made of solid blocks of grey granite. Built to last, these houses will still be here in a thousand years' time. In this world or any other. Strong enough to withstand the dour Scottish climate of constant rain, rain and more freezing rain. And the occasional day when the sun shines and it snows in the afternoon and then hails at night time - summertime.

  The Professor's house is on the brow of the hill, where the road levels off and sweeps round in a great curve back towards the city centre. The views from here are commanding, and hence the reason these magnificent houses command such a lofty price. The most expensive houses in Edinburgh.

  I walk up the garden path, ring the doorbell, and half expect a manservant or maid to answer the door and bid me enter. Instead, Professor Kasparek greets me personally, and ushers me into the back of the house, to the reception room where the great Steinway grand piano still dominates the room.

  The Professor sees me looking at it, as we sit down opposite each other in the large comfortable chairs around the open fireplace.

  "Aha…so, you see I have the piano in this world, just as in the other. Although, in your world, I probably play it somewhat better."

  I laugh.

  "So you believe me then. You accept that I have somehow made a jump from one world to another?" I ask him, seizing upon his words.

  "My dear boy, I have been up half the night, pondering what you told me yesterday. For the life of me, I cannot understand how you came to know the things you somehow did. I invite so few people back to my house, and nowadays I live the lifestyle of a virtual recluse. I have few friends, real friends, and seldom get drunk. To the best of my knowledge, ---and believe me, such things you do not discuss lightly,---I have never told anyone about my loss. I have loved only once in my life, and never again. I just want to ask you a few questions though, and I want to see your eyes when you reply to me. So come close to me, so that I can see you properly."

  I respond obediently, moving onto the edge of my chair, and wiping the hair away from my face and forehead so that he can clearly see my eyes.

  "James, I will ask you just a few questions, and by watching your response as you answer, I will know whether you are lying to me, or telling me the truth. So don’t lie. It will serve no purpose."

  "Ask away…"

  "James Quinn, Tell me,…is everything that you told me the truth?"

  "It is." I answer effortlessly.

  "Is this a strange game that you are playing with me or are you sincere?"

  "I am sincere."

  "To the best of your knowledge, do you come from another world, one very similar to ours, but with a common past and different future?"

  "I do." I add. "But I do not understand the how, or the why. I was hoping that you may be able to explain it to me…"

  The old Professor sits back, an excitement burning fresh in his eyes.

  "Amazing. You did not lie. You have told the truth. I have studied the art of NLP…that's Neuro Linguistic Programming…a little hobby of mine, and when someone lies, they signal the lie with tell-tale unconscious facial muscular movements and with a movement of the eyeballs. You did not. You told the truth." He stands up and goes to a drinks cabinet near the window. "Would you like a drink? I think I need one myself."

  "Please…"

  "….a Glenmorangie?"

  "Exactly."

  As he hands me the glass he says, "Everything you told me about my past, that is the common past we shared before the time at which our two worlds must have diverged, is true. But after the divergence, things were a little different between our experiences. For example, you said yesterday that in your world, my mother died in 2006. In this life, she died in 2009. After Rosa died, I spent most of my life dedicated to looking after her. Since she has gone, I have been very alone, but I do not know how to change. I am as I am. A recluse. I have my physics and that is my passion. That is why I have not retired yet. That and the sad fact that I really have nothing to retire to."

  I am looking around the room now, admiring the paintings on the walls.

  "Which brings me to another small difference between your world and mine. In this world, the picture of the Rose now hangs in my bedroom upstairs. True, it used to be my favorite in Skye, but when my mother died, I moved it down here. It helps me remember…"

  The whisky is so smooth that as I sip it, I hardly notice the liquid pass down the back of my throat and into my stomach.

  "Special Reserve. Over thirty years old," the Professor announces, as if he is reading my mind. "...But now to business, my boy, now to business." He picks up a notepad from the coffee table which separates us, and starts to look at his notes. I recognise the notepad as the same one he scribbled on so actively yesterday afternoon.

  I know that now is the time for me to be silent and follow the Professor's lead. Speak only in reply to his questions. He is silent for awhile, and then he starts.

  "I have thought a lot about what you have told me. I do not pretend to understand what has happened to you. But, assuming that it actually has, then there must be some sort of explanation…there always is."

  "I have studied Quantum Mechanics for a long, long time. I was a good friend of Professor Higgs at Edinburgh, and marveled at his ideas and his postulation of the Higgs Particle. A genius. More of a genius than I will ever be. I digress, I am sorry. Anyway, I know a few other physicists who have been working on an interesting theory which could explain the experiences that you claim to have had…In a new branch of quantum mechanics, which I must admit, even I found a little hard to understand when I first looked at it...What's interesting is that they have described the theoretical existence of an event such as that which would apparently seem to have happened to you. I will try to explain what they mean…James, you will remember, will you not, the equation of Heisenberg?"

  "His 'uncertainty principle’?" I ask.

  "Exactement…" he says in French, which sounds rather odd, spoken with his Polish accent. "His fabulous theorem which in one way states that matter can either be described as a wave of energy or a physical particle with mass and velocity, but where we can never be sure of the exact state of both…"

  "...Where we can only have true knowledge of one state of existence, and whereby if we conduct research to gain an insight into the condition or possible condition of the other state, that we thereby lose all knowledge of the original state that we knew of?" I add.

  "Yes. And you will also recall, what a gluon is?" he asks.

  "Yes…"

  "Or that all matter exists, but is constantly transforming itself into energy, and changing its state from a physical reality, to a wave of pure energy, before it retransforms itself back into matter again. Essentially that we are constantly recreating ourselves?"

  "Yes…"

  "And that at the point when matter has become energy, and is in the process of transforming itself back into matter, it has a myriad of options as to how it can recreate itself. The biggest mystery being, the how and the why of why it actually transforms itself into essential
ly the same identical particle it used to be…when in fact, it could become so many other things…are you with me still?"

  I nod.

  "Another way to look at this, is that at any point in time, when we recreate ourselves from what we were before, we have a million, a trillion, no, an infinite number of different possible futures. At the quantum level, each of these particle futures will occupy a different point in the space-time continuum, and will lie on a different time-line. In other words, each particle has an infinite number of different futures that it can follow. Now, each time a particle destroys itself, transforms itself into energy, and then recreates itself, it takes a little step forward in time, on its individual time-line, into its chosen future. When we connect up all the little events it undergoes, the line we draw connecting its past events to its future events prescribes the 'time-line', or the 'life-line' or 'life' of the particle. Whatever you want to call it."

  I take another sip of the whisky, mesmerized by the Professor’s words.

  "Now that is all on a quantum level. If we step backwards to the classical level, and onto a much larger scale, where we no longer see particles or quarks but rather humans and mountains and planets, the world around us, we can now see that at any point in time, before we take a step forward into the future, there are an infinite number of different possibilities for that future. In other words, there are an infinite number of timelines that we can take. Each one different from each other. But all sharing a common past."

  "Now, according to many leading theorists, many of whose work you studied with me at Edinburgh, such theorems have always conjectured but never proven, that each of these myriad of different possible timelines actually co-exist together. Multiple, parallel existences. The stuff of 'parallel dimensions' much heralded about on TV in the Z-Files and such like. "

  "You mean the 'X'-files…?"

  "No, I mean the 'Z'-files. I should know. It's one of my favorite TV programs. You can pick whatever letter you want in your world, but in this world, on this timeline…the letter is 'Z'! We call it the ‘Z-files’."

  "A case in point. A good example. Thanks…" I add, humbly, resisting the urge to re-emphasize that in my world, we call it the X-Files.

  "Now, getting back to where I was..." the Professor continues. "I was saying that even as we speak, in this room, all around us, there are a million different parallel timelines running, each line threading its own path through time. Now what would happen if at some point, for no apparent reason whatsoever, two of these different timelines were to cross paths, or to intersect? And at the instant they intersect, is it possible for particles from one timeline to innocently cross over to the other timeline and continue onwards into a new future on the other timeline? A future with a different past than all the other particles on that new timeline?"

  "To 'jump' from one timeline to another? From one world to another parallel world?"

  "Exactly...spot on."

  "Now, let me ask you another question. Have you heard of String Theory?"

  "Yes… but I don’t know much about it." I reply.

  "Well, James, basically, for a while it was all the rage. People used to think that particles, dimensions, time itself was explainable in terms of strings. Now, using that analogy, imagine for a second that the timelines themselves were strings. Imagine that they bump into each other, and cross each other’s paths. Once they touch, perhaps it is possible that two timelines get tangled up, or intertwined…maybe not permanently, perhaps just temporarily,…who knows…"

  "Perhaps it is possible that for a while the two timelines are attracted to each other, each continuing to exist independently but spiraling and circling around the other as they move forwards in time. Spinning around each other in some form of quantum dance. Now, the question you may ask is, why would they continue to spin around each other…and perhaps an answer to that question would be that when the particle from one ‘timeline’…let's call it ‘Timeline A’,…when the particle from ‘Timeline A’ jumps to ‘Timeline B’, it still manages to exert some kind of force on its friends that remain on the other timeline -‘Timeline A’. In other words, the two timelines attract each other, and begin to tangle up again."

  "But as time goes on, the effect that the particle which has jumped onto the new timeline continues to have on its friends left behind on the other timeline, begins to diminish, and the attraction between the timelines begins to fade."

  I hold up my hand, interrupting him.

  "I know where you are going. In other words, you are saying that for a while, the two timelines will spin around each other, and occasionally bump into each other and perhaps intersect, but the longer the particle remains on the new timeline, the less it will happen. The attraction decreases with time. So eventually the two timelines will separate completely and become independent again."

  "Almost," the Professor takes over again, "...except for one thing. At first the intensity by which the timelines will tangle with each other will increase, but then after a number of collisions, the intensity will decrease."

  "I don’t understand."

  "And why should you? What I am saying is only an idea, one of many possible explanations that may be true," he says, waving his hand gently in the air.

  "But, it makes so much sense," I argue.

  "That it does my boy. Or it may be complete and utter rubbish... But let us assume for one moment that it may be a good description of the events we are questioning and not a bad one... Now, in that case, what would our new idea tell us?"

  He looks at me with raised eyebrows. I shrug my shoulders.

  "I don’t know…what? You tell me."

  "The model, if we can call it that, would tell us that a particle that makes the 'jump', as you say in your parlance, would have, ...'may' have, several opportunities to make the 'jump' back to where it came from. To rejoin its original timeline. The model also tells us, that at first, the intensity of the collisions between the timelines would seem to increase…this is borne out by your experiences so far…but after awhile, the intensity will decrease, and the lines will separate. Perhaps for good. In other words, you could almost say, that once the particle has accidentally strayed from one timeline to another, that mother nature will give it a few chances to 'jump' back to where it belongs. But if the particle does not make the ‘jump’, the opportunities will stop. There will also be an optimal time, at which the 'jump' should occur. On either side of this optimal time the 'jump' may be possible, but at some point afterwards a safe 'jump' will no longer be feasible and should not be attempted."

  The Professor stands up and walks back to the drinks cabinet, waving his glass at me to ask if I too want a refill. I shake my head.

  His last few words hang in the air, their significance not lost on my ears.

  "So how many opportunities will I get to make the jump? Before it is too late? And when will the optimal time be to do it?" I ask.

  The Professor fills his glass and returns to his seat, picking out a small red notebook from the breast pocket of his shirt, and flicking it open.

  "Good questions. For you I imagine, they are the most important questions. I too, wondered how many times the timelines would cross, and I have done some calculations to model their possible behavior. Of course, we are not talking about particles here, we are talking about you, a grown man. A man who is made up of untold billions of tiny atomic particles, each of distinct energy and mass… But, based upon your weight/mass, I have calculated your equivalent energy, and estimated the attraction between the timelines..."

  "And?"

  "And my calculations would suggest that there is enough attraction between your timeline and mine for them to intersect eight or nine times. No more. The optimal time to cross over being the fourth time it happens. After that, there is a danger the lines will diverge before any jump could successfully be completed."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean, that after the fourth time, the attraction may not be great enough
to enable the jumping body to recreate itself properly on the original timeline. In other words, the body may try to cross, but be lost in the translation between the events…or it may cross but reassemble itself into some other form. Perhaps not a form that could sustain life. In other words, if you to try to make the jump too late, you will die."

  He leans forward and pats me on the thigh. "Now, don't dwell on that. Think rather about what is important. The thing is that from what you have told me, you already have had two possibilities to jump back. That’s two out of four."

  "But the first time was far too short. And the second time I couldn’t get to the door…"

  "I know. You said. But, to a certain extent what has happened to you, backs up the model. You see, the first time it happened, it lasted only a fraction of a second. The next time it lasted longer, although still only momentarily. I would predict that the third time it happens you will experience it for even longer. And the next time, it will last long enough…although perhaps still maybe only a minute, perhaps two, for you to complete the jump. After that, though, the next time it will last only a fraction of that, and then by the sixth time, you may not even notice it…"